The invention relates to the use of a portion of a propellant charge as a sealing medium for a sabot of a subcaliber projectile.
In the coassigned U.S. Pat. No. 3,620,167 there is disclosed a subcaliber projectile with a sabot having a gas pressure receiving surface that is covered with a flat sealing element made of elastic material. This sealing element serves to prevent the escape of the propellant charge gases through gaps formed by the joints that are present between the segments forming the sabot. Such gaps formed by the joints between the segments forming the sabot may cause difficulties during the separation of the segments from the subcaliber projectile body. However, this known sealing element has been found in practice to constitute a disturbing component of the dead weight of the subcaliber projectile.